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Sucks to Suck

Written by: Mike Roza

Saturday, September 10th, 2016 will live in infamy as the day that the benevolent black and orange clad Poke fans of Stillwater, Oklahoma will resent for a very long time. Well, more realistically, the remainder of this season since now they have to eliminate the word ‘Playoff’ from their vocabulary. In case you don’t own a television or are ignorant to the magic that is collegiate sports, Cooper Rush of the Central Michigan Chippewas chucked up a floater on the final play of the game. This lob came on behalf on an untimed down awarded to the Chippewas due to a penalty on Oklahoma State that extended the game for one final play. That prayer landed safely into the waiting arms of Jesse Kroll just outside of the ten yard line. Normally a tackle is made, but Kroll had the presence of mind to lateral the ball back to teammate Corey Willis, who ran vertically across the field and found the end zone to pull off another major upset to begin the young 2016 NCAA College Football season. It was dy-no-mite to watch , and shucks I wish I saw it live, but I was busy watching Nebraska cap off their 4th quarter slaughter of Wyoming.

Anyway, that’s the guts of the miracle toss and catch in Stillwater, but we found out almost immediately there was one major problem: Central Michigan never should have been given that untimed down. It seems that the MAC Conference refs shit the bed and ignored, or conveniently forgot, that there is a rule that is in that book that they are paid to follow that states a game cannot be extended on a grounding call if it causes a loss of down. OOPS! Oh boy. This nefarious crew of officials got theirs though. They are currently suspended at this time for, you know, not knowing the rules. The Big 12 took this result with surprising poise seeing that they are now Old Mother Hubbard with only Texas, West Virginia and Baylor in the cupboard after losses by perennial winners Oklahoma, TCU and Kansas State as well. However, Cowboy AD Mike Holder wasn’t as kosher with the result as his conference was. To paraphrase his response with an example that our generation can understand, Holder essentially cried to the media about OK State being victimized by a horse shit f***ing call.

Well Mr. Holder, did you watch the game? I know I didn’t, but I think you certainly get paid handsomely to so I would hope you saw the whole thing. For Tim Tebow’s sake, the Pokes won the turnover and penalty battle, two categories that traditionally spell victory. The Cowboys were outgained at home by exactly eighty total yards from scrimmage. The Chippewa offense stayed on the field for 35:23 and totaled sixty-eight plays ran. You returned EIGHTEEN starters from your 2015 team that made it to the Sugar Bowl and got outperformed on both sides of the ball by a mid-tier MAC team! OK State is in the Power 5 with recruiting classes under Mike Gundy that repeatedly rank in the top fifty each season. Central Michigan? According to 247sports, their most recent recruiting class this season ranked in at a most excellent number one hundred and twenty-one in the country. Central Michigan did not even recruit one single four star recruit. CMU hadn’t even defeated a ranked opponent since 1991. But, Mr. Holder, you are right sadly. People get paid money to do their job. Not one person I know likes when someone else doing their job that they are paid to do negatively impacts them and their happiness. The packed house at Boone Pickens was robbed. The Big 12 lost yet another team early from playoff contention. And lastly, Mike Gundy, who is a man and is now well over forty, had to apologize to his kids for this one for calling a pass play instead of running the ball. Sadly Mr. Holder, I’m sorry, but the whistle blew and that means the game is over. Sucks to suck.